


There's An Old Flame Burning In Your Eyes

by trainwhistlesatnight



Category: Skulduggery Pleasant - Derek Landy
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Canonical Character Death, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Graphic Description, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Or actually romantically together you decide, Platonic Life Partners, ask to tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-11
Updated: 2020-03-11
Packaged: 2021-02-28 16:47:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,069
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23100421
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trainwhistlesatnight/pseuds/trainwhistlesatnight
Summary: Sometimes Skulduggery dreams, and when he dreams, he remembers.And some memories are too hard to deal with alone.
Relationships: Ghastly Bespoke & Skulduggery Pleasant, Ghastly Bespoke/Skulduggery Pleasant
Comments: 2
Kudos: 24





	There's An Old Flame Burning In Your Eyes

**Author's Note:**

> If you wanna talk to me or have ideas or requests, message me at train-whistles-at-night on Tumblr!

Sometimes, when the night was too quiet, too dark; Skulduggery dreamed. Or, something close to dreamed. Often he relived old memories that should have been forgotten. Should have shut in a box, locked, duct taped, and thrown in a river just in case. When Skulduggery dreamed, he remembered. He remembered rivers, trying to match bones together, click, push, _force_ them into place. He remembered darkness. He remembered searing, boiling pain. He remembered struggling and screaming all around him. His flesh burning, a white hot pain. Like work shop nails digging under skin, dragging, pulling, cutting tender flesh and meat.

Being hung, an unholy symbol, up on a pyre like the Christ he used to believe in growing up. Nails, thick as stakes, pierced threw his skin, his muscle, his bone into the wooden cross, and tied for good measure. Nefarian Serpine would not have his treat fall in the midst of the show.

Skulduggery could remember the smell of his own clothes, his hair, his skin, his body burning. He could remember his screams, he could remember not being able to breathe- how his lungs ached and ached and he couldn't _breathe, oh God, God help, God please, please please please I don't want to die PLEASE-_

Then silence.

Waking up, coming to his senses. No heart to race, but feeling the fear, the thrumming fight-or-flight response energy from such a nightmare of a memory. There was no fire, nothing burning, nothing even cooking to spark a memory. But, there was rain outside.

Skulduggery was not afraid of rain, and he stepped out into it, determined to make his brain that was not there, sure that he was no longer on the pyre. No longer burning. No longer dying.

That was all finished long ago.

He drove in the night, headlights on bright, and in less than an hour, and feeling like less than five minutes in his disassociation, he had arrived to a destination he didn't even plan to go to. But, Ghastly's home was a welcome sight, even the dark with the lights off. There was a key under the dirt an inch or two, because anything else would have been too obvious, or the mud had buried it. Skulduggery wasn't sure, he just knew Ghastly would not appreciate having his door broken open. Skulduggery let himself inside, and whether Ghastly was home or not, he was staying there for the night. The lights were all off. Skulduggery untied his boots, undid his tie, unbuttoned his suit jacket, setting them all aside neatly. He sat on the couch after moving the water off himself, and letting it drain in the sink after a moment of wondering what to do with it. The remote was on a table to the right of the couch, and he turned on the TV, and searched for something to watch.

He ended up on a channel displaying the whole series of _Harry Potter_ for the next so many hours, and it, while mostly entirely wrong in its display of magic, was familiar and somewhat comforting.

The noise, though quiet, woke Ghastly, and soon Skulduggery heard the rustling of Ghastly getting out of bed, and sleepily walking down the hall to the living room.

Most would be surprised at hearing someone in their home in the middle of the night, and Ghastly was at first, but then again, most burglars did not decide to sit on your couch, turn on your TV and watch _Harry Potter_ movies in the middle of their burglaring. So, Ghastly figured it wasn't a burglar, and probably a Dead Man, though whether it was the actual dead one or one of the alive ones was a whole different subject to deal with when he got there.

Lo and behold, it was the genuinely dead one, sitting quite comfortably on his couch and watching TV. Ghastly acknowledged Skulduggery, then went and used the restroom, and came back, sitting beside him on the couch, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. "Which movie is it on?"

"The one with the large snake. Chamber of Secrets, I believe." Ghastly nodded.

"Got a few to go, then. Are you alright?"

Sometimes it was easier to go ahead and ask the question you already knew the answer to. Skulduggery settled one hand over the over in his lap.

"I.. had a nightmare. Or, reliving of a memory." Ghastly nodded slowly.

"Which one?" He asked, because there were always so many one could remember from times of war. And Ghastly knew more than he let on, and he wondered if tonight Skulduggery would talk about it.

But that wasn't the dream, and so he didn't. Another time then.

"Dying, waking up and putting myself back together." He answered, the barest hint of a shake in his usually steady voice. Skeletons could not cry. People could.

Ghastly knew crying could be good for you, and brought Skulduggery close, slowly and gently, with his hands always in sight. He tapped the sigils on Skulduggery's collarbones, and fixed skin came back, flowing over him. Organs filled him, muscles and nerves and tissue. And in a moment, Skulduggery was crying, weeping into Ghastly's shoulder, trying to hold on tight to him, like Ghastly would disappear if he didn't. But Ghastly did not disappear. He stayed, and held Skulduggery tightly, rubbing his back and soothing him.

Skulduggery was not often an open man, but he was this night, sobbing apologies, fears, how he was so, so scared, how he couldn't breathe in the dream. When he began to hyperventilate from his crying, Ghastly soothed him, guiding him to slow his breathing. 

_ "Five in, five out. Five in, five out. You're doing good, you're alright, keep breathing with me, okay?" _

Soon Skulduggery's breathing slowed and settled. He calmed, still holding Ghastly tightly. Ghastly gently pried out of his grip, disappearing into the kitchen and returning with paper towels and a water bottle. Ghastly was gentle, guiding Skulduggery's head as he wiped his nose and dried his tears. He rubbed his back as Skulduggery drank the provided water, eyes still watery and wet. Later, he might cry again, with over 300+ years of tears to get out, and when he did, Ghastly would be there with love and comfort as he always was.

For now, though, they cuddled close on the couch, and watched as the third _Harry Potter_ movie came on.


End file.
